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Monday, April 23, 2012

So there’s a naked man in the kitchen…

What would you do if you showed up for work one day and the
guy you’re supposed to be working for shows up naked? And no, please don’t
imagine your current boss naked. That would just be wrong. Unless your boss
looks like the cover of my newest release, Beauty
and The Best. Then, by all means, go ahead and imagine it.

And never ever
quit that job.

But if this happened to you, what would you do? How would
you react? What would you call him? Big
guy?

It’s a question the heroine, personal chef Jolie Gardener,
has to address when she’s preparing breakfast for Todd Best, her new boss.
Considering Todd does look like the
cover of the book, it’s no surprise that a few things start burning…

The thought registered just as the terse, “Who the hell are
you?” had Jolie Gardener spinning around faster than a figure skater on speed.

He had the nerve
to ask this? He of the broad shoulders, six-pack abs, and other, nice, um,
parts...

Really. A naked man. In her kitchen.

Well, technically, she was in a naked man’s kitchen.
Even more technically, she was in a naked Todd Best’s kitchen—and there wasn’t
one hint of self-consciousness or embarrassment on his part. Of course with
that body, there shouldn’t be. The guy should
flaunt his nudity for the world to see. Which, at present, consisted of one
single, solitary person: Jolie Gardener, aspiring writer and personal chef
extraordinaire.

“Well?” His hands slammed to his hips.

“You’re naked,” she squeaked, which, really, was the only
way to state that kind of obvious.

“I’m what?” Mr. Six-Pack Abs glanced down.

Jolie tried not to—so unsuccessfully it was pitiful.

“Shit,” he muttered. “I am. I, uh, fell asleep last night…”

As butter sizzled in the new super-slick omelet pan on the
top-of-the-line range, Jolie’s gaze alternated between some rock-hard abs and a
scruffy eight a.m. shadow while her fingers danced along the speckled granite
countertop in search of a napkin, placemat, oven mitt… something.

Mercifully, they scooped up a thick dishtowel that, in her
world, would constitute a very plush, very luxurious hand towel from The Ritz
or The Four Seasons, but which, here, apparently, was used to soak up water
from designer flatware. She dangled it in the direction of Mr. Au Naturel.
“Here.”

He placed an empty bottle of Jim Beam on the island
countertop with a clink,
then took the towel with a grunt. “So, who are you, what are you doing in my
kitchen, and would you mind turning around?”

She turned. “I’m the new girl the agency sent over.”

“Hell. There better be some aspirin left,” he muttered
beside her, his bare (of course) feet making no sound on the limestone floor.

Sadly, no naked hot guy has ever shown up on my first day on
the job. No, I get the jobs where the office manager rents out the choicest
office to her father for 1/5th of the rent, among other bad business decisions
that drive the company into bankruptcy. Or the boss who had perjured himself on
the stand for another corporate executive who then said to him, “You’ll never
have to worry about a job ever again.” So true; the guy showed up at the office
and did nothing. Absolutely nothing. I’d ask him who we should have as a
speaker or what event we should do at the corporate meeting and all I’d get in
response was a shrug while holding his palms up. Seriously. And he wonders why
I couldn’t stand him.

Then there’s the job where I found out that the so-called
“owner” isn’t really named John Q. Public * (*name changed to protect me from
lawsuits). No, this guy’s name is John K. Publick and the reason he’s using the
misspelled name is because, um, he doesn’t want anyone to google him and find
his jail term sentencing for insider training. Or the one for fraud.

I kid you not.

So, yeah, I’d say a naked man in the kitchen would be a
welcome change after some of the stuff I’ve seen through the years in the
“real” world. Someday I’ll write that book.
And you know what? No one will believe it. Truth really is stranger than
fiction.

So, what’s your Day Job horror story? Worst horror story
will win an PDF copy of Beauty and The Best. I’ll pick the
winner after 5 pm eastern on the 26th to be announced on the 27th. Be sure to
leave your email with your horror story so we can get in touch with you if you
win.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoy Todd and Jolie’s
Once-Upon-A-Time Romance!

Beauty and The Best is
available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords
and is currently on sale for $2.99. But hurry; this price won’t last much
longer.

PRISM Award and Golden Leaf Award-winning author, Judi
Fennell, has had her nose in a book and her head in some celestial realm all
her life, including those early years when her mom would exhort her to “get
outside!” instead of watching Bewitched or I Dream of Jeannie on
television. So she did—right into Dad’s hammock with her Nancy Drew books.

These days she’s more likely to have her nose in her laptop
and her head (and the rest of her body) at her favorite writing spot, but she’s
still reading, whether it be her latest manuscript or friends’ books.

Author of “fairy tales with a twist,” pun-filled,
tongue-in-cheek, contemporary paranormal romances, starting with the Tritone
Trilogy about Mermen and the Humans who love them, her Bottled Magic Series
about genies and magic and falling in love, and now her Once-Upon-A-Time
Romances, those twisted fairy tales that were the inspiration for her tagline.

Dive into the romance on her website, www.JudiFennell.com, for
excerpts, deleted scenes, reviews, contests, and pictures from reader and
writer conferences

15 comments:

Unfortunate no hot guys where I am, I am a medical biller in a doctors office and had to answer the phones. I got a call and this lady thinks its ok to tell me in detail on her medical issue about wormns. I will not metion where, and i did not know it was possible so I was grossed out the rest of the day.

I would love to find a naked guy in my kitchen. Of course after I take my kids to school. LOL.My work story is when I was about 22 years old I worked Front Desk at a very busy hotel. I was working the overnight shift and had a guest call down stating to call 911 because there other person in the room was having a heart attach. I called 911 and the ambulance showed up. Come to find out that the lady that called was the mistress of the man, he died while having sex with her. The wife showed up later, but the mistress was already gone. I felt horrible for the wife to have to find out like that.

One night while working at a very well respected hotel we received a call about a man banging on a door. I went up and here is an older naked man (like the age of my grandfather) banging on the door. He got up to use the restroom and wandered naked out the wrong door. I go get a key to his door and hand him a towel. He hands it back to me, I kid you not. Get the door open, he walks in, turns around and shuts the door, didn't even say 'thank you.'

Found out in the morning that his wife slept through the whole thing but the rest of the floor all heard him. I really wanted to tell them that they were lucky they hadn't seen him naked. That was one episode that it was better to hear than see.

Mmmm I am not sure what I would do if I found a naked man on my first day of work.. Not that it ever happened to me.. I think my worst job was as a assistanct to a wharehouse managaer, I had to work mostly with men all day and they could be very arcastic in their comments soemtimes, and think it was funny... I could have gone at them for sexual harrasemnt, but I just quit instead...

Kathleen, yes, I've been in an all-male environment. I was always amazed at the combination of cuss-words they could string together. Or when they'd want to beat each other up one minute and the next, they were shaking hands and going to lunch together.

I once worked for a combo English as a Second Language Dept./ESL office in a college. One of the bosses was afraid to ask the Latina workers to do anything for fear she'd be considered prejudiced (which she obviously was because she was afraid to ask them to do what they were paid to do) so she dumped all the work on me. When I called her on it, she said I was paid to work. I said yeah, minimum wage and so are they, it's only fair to rotate the work. Nothing changed so I quit. Boy, was she working in the wrong dept.